


Sammy Radcliff - Agent of...."I kinda lost track"

by aceofhearts88



Series: STRIKE Team Alpha Series [8]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: F/M, but the OCs are standing in the focus, escaping from the Triskelion, helping out during Sokovia, lots of MCU characters pop up or are mentioned, relationships are mentioned but not the focus
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-22
Updated: 2017-03-22
Packaged: 2018-10-09 04:38:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,006
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10404129
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aceofhearts88/pseuds/aceofhearts88
Summary: Recently her life had been a mix between "I AM FREAKING OUT" and "Come, fight me, if you dare!!!", and it's not allowing her to catch a break.Sammy Radcliff escapes the hell that is Hydra rising from the shadows in the Triskelion and then spends nearly two years in fear over the fate of three of her closest friends.--It won't make much sense reading this as a stand-alone Oneshot as it focuses on OCs that have all been introduced in "Walking it Off"





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [SamanthaB](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SamanthaB/gifts).



Sammy had once, in a blue night, feeling frustrated with work and down over all, asked herself what she would do if her friends didn't return from a mission. How it would feel to lose someone else after Laura and Cooper had been ripped away from her, after Uncle Clint had turned into Agent Barton because the pain had been eaten at the relationship between them until they had cut it to save themselves any more.

And of course she had to wonder, prepare herself even. 

Losing Laura had been hard, had come unexpected.

But Laura had been an analyst, not a field agent.

And certainly not a Strike agent.

So she had laid there in her bed in her little apartment in DC, staring at the stars painted to her ceiling and had asked herself how it would feel to lose Sarah, Julie or Tess. Or god forbid all of them.

How it would feel to one day to stand down in the hangar and not see all three of them walk out of a jet. Or to see Maria walking up to her in the control room, face closed off, bearing bad news. To maybe sit at the communication line herself and accept the call in over a fallen agent.

You think about it, you try to prepare yourself for the moment because in their line of work, it wasn't near to impossible to one day pay with your life. 

\--

Things changed when the sky opened and hell rained down on New York, everything changed that day, things got worse and so much more dangerous. Missions became riskier for everyone, Sammy stepped down from all field work because Maria needed her in oversight more than ever, Strike rushed from one back-to-back mission set to another.

Truth be told, there was barely any time for her to start wondering about what ifs anymore.

So of course then it happened.

\--

Even years later, with a husband at her side, with friends close by, watching her children laugh and play, Sammy will still remember Steve's speech word for word. She will still remember seeing Strike agents crowding into the control room, she will see Rumlow's face and she will remember knowing that something was turning very very wrong. 

Sammy will still remember seeing Sharon pulling the gun on Rumlow and everyone else around her following up while her hand goes for the phone buzzing in her hand. Maria's text was still saved on her phone, even now where they have peace, like a bright and burning reminder what they went through.

'Strike is Hydra. Get out! Run!'

And she didn't think, she didn't spare a look for anyone around her as Sharon got into it with Rumlow, for once she couldn't have cared less for selfish sacrifycing herself for the greater good. Fury was dead, and she hadn't sworn on ounce of loyalty to Pierce.

Find Zach. Find Zach and get out. 

Like an endless mantra in her head as she rushed through the corridors full of screaming and panicking people running towards the exits of the Triskelion. Sammy had trouble pushing through them, to run in the opposite direction, to get down to deeper levels, dodging stray shots of Strike agents left and right, her head not even going for the questions then.

She had to get to Zach.

Her calls didn't get picked up.

But then she was crashing through to the science lab levels, empty and deserted almost, people have already taken flight. 

"ZACH!" She yelled then, loud and desperate, and that was of course when the alarms really started blaring and the whole building shook. No idea as to what was going on, Sammy only yelled louder and ran faster.

They needed out.

"ZACH!"

And then a scream, coming from the direction of her best friend's lab and Sammy didn't think at all anymore, just pulled her gun and flew around the corner. She found Zachary clutching his left arm to his chest and holding a syringe in his right hand, still raised high, and at his feet laid a knocked out agent in a white lab coat. 

Getting aware of her presence, Zach whirled around, eyes wide and wild, syringe only falling out of his fingers when he really saw her.  
"He...Sam, he...Tyson Hail-Hydra-ed me..." He stuttered out but Sammy couldn't answer him, the building shook again and the alarms got shriller. Grabbing Zach's hand, she tugged at him until he stumbled after her out of his lab.

Down the corridor. Down another one. Staircase. 

The building began to creak all around them.

Up a floor. Up another.

The sound of explosions. Thundering crashes. 

They needed OUT.

One more set of stairs. Out of the staircase. Down a corridor, lights going out, emergency lights flickering on.

Red light everywhere.

And then the ground shook so hard it felt like an earthquake.

No more holding onto each other's hands, Zach and her were running side by side then, pure instinct and raw training kicking in. No longer two best friends, no longer Shield's top analyst and Shield's Deputy Director's assistant.

No, sliding around corners more gracefully and smoother than on any other occasion, they had turned back into what they had been raised into. Him, the kid grown up in an Academy used to raise deadly women. Her, the kid raised by Shield's former Director, born to be an agent.

Exit in sight. Smoke everywhere. Water... trailing in from the main staircase.

And shots fired.

Pushing Zach to the ground, Sammy whirled around and her head didn't even compute the identity of the person stalking towards her until she was already returning fire. Two Strike agents were edging towards them, one of them holding up Jack and Sammy for the first time had a first moment of inner white noise.

Strike was Hydra.

Oh god, Strike was Hydra.

Tess. Julie. Sarah.

"Give us the boy and we'll give you a chance." Agent Phillips was snarling at her, gun raised and aimed, just like Sammy did it herself, behind her Zach went deadly still.   
"Never gonna happen." She sneered right back, clicking off the safety on her gun again, eyes narrowing even more when Jack looked up, face bloody, his gaze slightly clouded and god she hoped the one who had done this to him had found even more pleasure than she now found in looking at him.

Traitor.

I thought I could trust you, she heard herself think, I thought you loved them.

The ground...no the whole building shook again, harder even this time and something heavy thumped against the door of the staircase, more water trickling down under it. Sammy got a very bad omnious feeling about it, she knew what laid above them on that side of the Triskelion, she knew this place inside out.

She knew where the hangar was.

And she knew even better what was above it.

But with her stomach dropping even further, she also saw their means to escape.

"Zach..." She began quietly and felt him slowly move up onto his feet again at her tone, "Prepare to run really really fast." She told him, praying to all the gods above in all nine fucking realms that her idea would work.

"Whatever you think you can do girl, you have no chance against us." Phillips threatened her, next to him Donalds shifted slightly under Jack's supposedly staggering weight. 

Traitors, her mind hissed, loud and ugly. Traitors, bastards.

And then she got the voices of her friends stumbling over themselves in her mind. Phillips is all loud bark and nothing behind it, Tess noted. Donalds will put the worth of his teammates over killing the enemy, Sarah explained. 

Jack is the biggest potential risk, Julie analyzed in her mind, a conversation about potential risks they had once joked around with after New York, he's a good shot, he's a good fighter, he is smart. Go for the important one, her grandfather's advise hit her as well, the others will always be ordered to protect the important one.

Hydra, she pumped herself up, traitors.

You deserve to die for making me believe you were good. You deserve to die for 

"NOW ZACH!" She screamed, shot at Jack and then whirled to the side, taking one more shot before pushing her already burning legs to run faster than she ever had before. As calculated Donalds went down as Jack screamed with the bullet hitting his shoulder and Phillip's shot at her went wide when both of them crashed against him.

It all went under though as her second shot hit the staircase door hinge and the door burst out of its hold as the water of the Potomac found a weakened barrier, streaming into the corridor like a floodwave.

And then it was running for them, water spilling around their feet, the flood chasing them as the enemy now, but at least this one wasn't shooting. As the fire exit door finally came into view, the water was already up to their knees and running had slowed into desperate treading against it. Sammy cursed as she took a shot at the glass door, realizing that though their way out was finally granted, her gun had just used its last bullet.

They stumbled and jumped outside, not bothering to look left or right, their hands met again as the water went wide outside the building and they could run again. Not sparing any attention for what was actually happening, Sammy turned them over to the parking lot. She had no intention to go for a car, let alone her own, the Triskelion had only one access road and no way that one wasn't blocked already.

No way out the obvious way.

Different plan.

She ran down the stairs at the back of the parking lot, ears intuned to any sound of people moving around them, Zach's hand in hers in a death grip. He might as well be the only one left out of her friends. 

\--

Sarah and her had once, a couple of years ago to be precise, spend an afternoon on stupid dares.

Sarah, bored out of her mind, not yet a Strike agent, still just a sniper on call who didn't get taken on missions without more experience. And Sammy, still a teenager, freshly joined into Shield's Academy for Communication, spending a free afternoon during her vacation internship at the Triskelion.

At the height of their exhilarated stupidity they had jumped off the railing in the garden into the Potomac. 

She knew a way off this fucking island.

"Oh, hell no." Zach caught onto her plan as well as the end of the green area came in sight, Samm tugged only harder on his hand and he still followed her blindly.  
"Oh, hell yes. Or do you want to turn around and get shot?" Sammy pointed out to him, throwing her empty gun somewhere off to the side, useless baggage. They stopped in front of the railing and she shrugged out of her uniform blazer in a rush, pushing her phone as deep into her pockets as possible, kicking off her shoes and then threw it all into the river below them.

Zach whined but still directed by panic and desperate fear, he let his lab coat and his own shoes follow. 

"Pretty sure that jerk didn't want to shoot me." Zach laughed out in pure hysteria and Sammy felt her own body shiver with it. No, they had wanted him and that scared her more than the alternative. Because if they wanted Zach, Hydra had spun very dangerous ties.  
"All the more reason to jump." She offered up, both of them already climbing upon the railing, explosions thundering in their ears, the sky was burning above them.

And as she jumped and held her breath, Sammy gave one glance up and her heart stopped as she caught sight of the exploding helicarrier in a nose dive for the Potomac. She only closed her eyes and drew her eyes away from it as her feet touched cold dark water. When she came back for air, Zach was already swimming for the shore, heading for the Western side of the Potomac, away from the inner city, hopefully away from the craziness.

Sammy ignored the looming threat of the helicarrier and pushed herself forward, stroke for stroke closing in on the graciously smooth land shore, only nature on that side. She crawled onto shore just as with a defining boom the sinking helicarrier went up onto blinding flames and crashed into the water, rippling a wave that followed them up the riverbank as they rushed for the cover of the trees.

And only there, surrounded by green and shadows, did they stop, hands pressed to their chests, and turned around.

Staring at the inferno. Staring at the betrayal. 

Staring at their lives go up in flames.

Shield in ruins. One helicarrier crashed right into the Triskelion. One into the hangar, water flooding in after it. And the last one still sinking into the river not far from them. 

"Are we winning?" Zach whispered after a moment of tense silence and Sammy had no idea.

\--

It was a long drive up to New Jersey in a stolen car. 

Tense silence as they shivered in their dripping clothes, heater in full blast. Sammy felt her eyes again and again drifting to her phone resting on the dashboard, dead, turned off. Too scared that someone might track them.

Not knowing where they were standing.

Zach dead silent and way too still next to her, his own phone turned off but still clutched in his hands, his mind a million miles away as she kept the car steady on the speed limit on the highway.

But Sammy felt her mind assaulted by a thousand questions now as the mundane task of driving gave her space to breathe. 

What was going on? How was Hydra still alive? Who was up there leading? Was there anything in Shield left that hadn't been crawling with traitors?

Strike was Hydra. Strike was Hydra. Rumlow. Rollins. All of Kappa and who knew who else.

Where were the girls? Where was Alpha?

She tried to wreck her brain with information over where her friends had been, where missions had put them. The last information she had over Alpha was the infiltration in Odessa, but hadn't that been supposed to have been finished weeks ago? Wasn't Hawkeye in Africa, sheduled for another check in tomorrow? 

Where was Maria? Natasha? Had Captain Rogers made it out? Had Sharon managed to get away from Rumlow? 

How many friends would she have lost come morning? 

And even worse, how many people would she have to call traitor come morning?

For now though she drove on, the sun beginning to set with every mile they left behind them.

\--

It was the dead of night when they dropped off the car in the parking lot of the church in the small town a few miles north of her grandparents' estate. Sammy even took a few minutes to wipe off all traces, throwing the keys down the drain a block from the church before they slipped into the forest.

Still not wearing shoes, bodies hurting and freezing as night fell, Sammy and Zach only pushed on, goal now clear in their minds. Sammy was only praying that there was still something to be looking forward to. 

They had no idea what was going on, how powerful Hydra was.

And how, just how, just goddamn how....

As her grandparents' house came into view though, it was all vibed from her mind as Zach gasped and they both caught sight of the figure pacing on the patio, one hand in his graying hair.

Her grandpa whipped around with a gun drawn though as they crashed out of the hedge surrounding the estate, running blind and with their last energy. And Theodore's cry of relief was heard loud and clear as he pocketed the gun again in his rush down the patio stairs, letting them crash against him with tears already running. 

"Oh god, you're okay. You're okay." He repeated at least a dozen times as he held them tight, arms around them as Sammy cried against her grandfather's chest, Zach shaking just as much next to her. And she only pushed away from both of them and looked up as the patio door got slammed open and her grandma and sister stumbled out at the same time, both of them gasping and crying in the next moment as well. 

Sammy stretched out a hand and caught her sister when Rita rushed down and over to her, throwing herself against her, her grandmother followed, didn't stop kissing her head and Zach's cheek over and over again.

And then they stood there. Just everyone holding onto each other.

No one said a word.

No one even knew what to say.

\--

Sammy only passed out that night because her body gave in to exhaustion after a warm shower and something to eat, but they were crowded around each other in the living room. Zach and her wrapped around each other on the couch, Rita curled into a ball on the armchair, her grandmother falling asleep in her rocking chair.

She was also sure that her grandfather didn't sleep for even a minute.

Keeping watch.

Their phones all dead. Too risky.

The landline cut off.

Only the TV running on CNN, constant information inflow over what had transpired in DC, even if no one still knew just what they were seeing.

At least until they knew who had won.

The morning would at least bring answer to that question, because Sammy was woken to the sound of her phone ringing. Her very much turned off phone ringing. 

Everyone scrambled up from their position and her grandpa even pulled his gun again, Zach and him scrambling to look out of the windows while Sammy stared at her insistently ringing phone. 

Caller ID unknown.

With her trembling fingers and Zach's eyes on her face, Sammy reached for the phone and set it on speaker just as she accepted the call.

And she had never, NEVER been so relieved to hear a friend's voice.

"Sammy?"

"Oh thank god, Sharon, you got out." She breathed out, falling back into the couch again, "I was so afraid Rumlow had gotten you."  
"Never." Sharon snorted but she sounded winded and still freaked out as well, "Are you somewhere safe? If not, I got somewhere you can come to. And sorry for the scare, I needed to find out if you were okay so I asked Jarvis to hack you." And that got Sammy's attention.  
"Jarvis? You're with Stark?" She wanted to know, her grandfather looking over to her.

"Closest family I have who could actually offer a safe place. We send protection to Aunt Peggy already." Sharon explained and Sammy saw her grandfather breathe out a sigh of relief, "Sammy, do you know anything? Maria? Romanov? Barton? Alpha?" Seemed Sharon had been plagued by the same thoughts.  
"No, I got a text from Maria when Rumlow stormed into the control room. I hightailed it out of there, got Zach and got out. I only know what the news channels are going on about." Sammy explained and then looked up when her grandfather sat down on the edge of the couch.

"Agent Carter." He spoke up, "Is Tony there with you? I'd like to speak with him." Theodore asked and Sharon quickly responded in the positive, her phone changed hands with a crickling sound.  
"I don't know anything either. Rogers is alive, that's the same bottom line I can give you, supposedly in a hospital in DC. I talked to a few doctors and sent suits down to protect the hospital. Jarvis is filtering through the information leaked onto the internet. I've got no word on Hill or Romanov."

"Barton?" Her grandfather wanted to know but Stark couldn't give him an answer there either.

And not a word on Alpha either.

Sammy got a very bad feeling.

\--

A feeling that only intensified in the next days as the real outcome of this nightmare was revealed.

Her grandfather had a long long conversation with a not so dead Nick Fury over the phone, with much yelling and much angry sighing and ranting, both men clearly shocked still over Alexander Pierce's game.

Maria was alive, so was Natasha. Captain Rogers would be fine. Tony Stark got Clint Barton out of his Hydra induced mess in Africa.

Other friends popped up alive, fine and most importantly not traitors.

Rumlow was declared death, that bastard, after a new ally Rogers had made testified that he had been buried by the helicarrier slicing the Triskelion nearly in half. Sammy wouldn't spare a single second of grief for it, found relief and joy even in it.

He had been Hydra. High up even. So much fucking control in his fucking hands.

A man the girls had trusted, a man her girls had trusted blindly in.

And it was of course then that her brain not only realized that among all the good news, no one had a word spent on Alpha's wellbeing, and then recalled that Rumlow had run control on the Odessa mission.

Bad feeling?

Try ulcer.

\--

Life went on.

It was terrible and unfair like that.

Life went on, with three of her best friends missing and potentially dead.

She traded Shield in for the Avengers under the disguise of Stark Industries. Sharon went to join the CIA, they needed oversight now. Needed to get control back.

Things heated up even more in their mad scramble out of the ditch when Thor returned to earth with information that Hydra fractions had Loki's scepter.

And just like that Alpha's missing status had to take a pause on the sidelines, even though it hurt, even though it broke her heart. Even though she barely slept sometimes in her fear. 

The fear that someday a call would come in, revealing that three amazing young women were dead, had paid the ultimate prize for their loyalty, their beliefs, their strengths.

But contrary to some people who made the switch from Shield to the Avengers with them, Sammy and Zach didn't for one second show doubt in the conviction that none of these deadly women would ever even think about betraying everything they were fighting for.

Not Julie, never Julie. Julie, who had escaped hell, who had fled from the horrors of her upbringing, who had thrown everything she knew into the wind and had built herself up again. Who turned her talents away from the shadows and towards the good guys. Who had to live with the risk of her old life catching up to her every single day of her life.

And Sammy didn't blame Zach one second for the fist he planted into Avery's face in their argument over Julie Seaway. He would always fight tooth and nail to defend the only other person who had made it out alive from under his father's control.

Not Tess, never Tess. Tess, who had been dragged into all of this just because she had protected a man she had once loved, just because of timing in the right place. Who was just so damn normal under all that awesome skills and talents. Who had connected with Sammy so quickly, who had made her feel like having an older sister out there.

And Sammy knew that no one blamed her for pulling a knife on Agent Frey when she insuniated that you could never trust a thief. No one would get away with daring to place Tess in the wrong life, because she had never done a thing wrong in her life.

Not Sarah, never Sarah. Especially never Sarah. Sarah, who had spent her entire childhood locked into a room under a mad man's disgusting control. Who had always let actions speak against the rumors of her origin. Who had despite all the defenses, despite all the truces in the world, never stopped hating Rumlow for what he had done to her. Who geeked out over the Howling Commandos, who turned into a blushing school girl when talking about Bucky Barnes.

But that was also what had people talking up a storm now. It wasn't Sarah's old loyalty to Kappa. It wasn't the thing she had had with Rumlow. It wasn't her status as Rumlow's only ever taken on student. It wasn't the non deniable fondness Sarah had carried for Jack.

It was her obsession with Bucky Barnes.

Because Bucky Barnes was the Winter Soldier.

And Sammy couldn't even swallow that pill herself yet. 

Could still recall how white her grandfather had turned upon learning that fact from Fury himself. 

Her grandfather who had grown up as the generation post war, grown up on the legends that Rogers, Barnes and the Howling Commandos had been. Her grandfather who had always had a thing for the more rough characters, who had as told in so many stories, never found a connection to the clean cut correctness of Captain America himself.

Her grandfather who they then learned had been the target of a thankfully botched up assassination attempt made by Hydra while he had still been the Director of Shield.

Sammy felt sick. Sick and sicker with every new piece of information.

And then someone spoke it out what people had been whispering about for weeks, put Sarah's name and Hydra into the same sentence and Clint lost it. Put three people into the hospital until Thor stopped him. Frustration and fear for his daughter, daughter-in-law and their best friends snapping over and mixing with the returned paranoia over Loki's scepter.

Sammy felt no pity for the agents with their broken bones, would have actually preferred to throw in a punch herself still.

Come and fight her, these girls were not traitors.

\--

Only she would meet the love of her life right as their world was standing on the edge of the apocalypse again.

\--

Ultron was an ugly distraction from the search for the Winter Soldier and Strike Team Alpha.

A terrible, horrible but effective distraction.

Sammy was not only on the helicarrier over the flying remains of Sokovia's main city, she was also dispatched to go down with one of the shuttles to bring citizens into safety. Pulling people onto the shuttle and shooting at fucking robots.

Her life had truly gone down the horror drain.

So far down the drain.

At least Zach was safe this time.

And in all of this chaos she suddenly, from one blink of an eye to the next, found herself standing in front of a tall young man with bright blue eyes and silver hair.

The speedster.

One of the twins.

And it was so ridiculous how for just a moment the chaos stopped.

So stupid and hormonal and teenage like.

Pathetic.

But then time snapped back in and she found herself being moved quicker than time itself from one position to the next as robots came at them. And while she was still gagging for air and desperately fighting down the urge to throw up a blue blur whizzed around her and took down the stupid robots intend to kill them all.

Maybe watching this on live TV would stop Zach from trying to force these stupid video games on her.

"Thanks." She called out, immediately moving to help two teenagers onto the shuttle, looking over her shoulder to the speedster, who smiled at her.  
"No problem." He told her in his accented English and then blurred off again, gone to save more people.

\--

Five minutes later she limbs over to where she saw Hawkeye dropping down on a seat as the shuttle takes off and the city below them falls. 

And everything inside of her begins to burn, scream and burn and hurt, as she sees the lifeless, bullet ridden body of the speedster lying at Hawkeye's feet.

\--

By a miracle he lives.

But he doesn't wake up.

\--

Sammy changed in Stark Industries' disguise work for the NAI without even a milisecond of doubt, even as Shield crawls out of its ruins.

As fucking Coulson crawls out of the darkness.

And if he lives, how can someone say that the girls died.

But of course barely anyone knows that Coulson is alive. 

When Coulson came at her with a proposal, Sammy went to her grandfather for advise and he made it easily clear to her that he would rather see her under the protection and support of the Avenger's base new agency than back in the hush-hush secrecy of Shield.

Zach said he didn't trust Shield anymore. 

So Sammy chose the NAI.

And later she would often ask herself what could have all happened if she hadn't.

Especially to the girls.

\--

The next months were just a blur again.

So much happening.

There just never was a single moment of quiet or peace allowed for her.

Captain Rogers turned into Steve.

And he approached her about helping in the Alpha case, help in finding and bringing the girls home. Dead or alive. Just home.

And as they worked together, Stark around or not, they grew closer. 

But so did she with Pietro.

\--

Her love life actually becomes a love life for a while.

Twisted. Complicated.

Mixed feelings.

Ugly break-up.

If only she had had time to really realize what was happening to her heart there.

\--

Laura was alive. Cooper was alive.

There were more Barton babies.

Rumlow alive. Rollins alive.

Barnes returned.

Rumlow was the fucking new leader of Hydra. Who hated her so much in this life?

What the fuck was happening with Barnes and Clint?

What the fuck was happening with Steve and Stark?

Barnes turned into Bucky.

Zach found Sarah's messages.

Sammy was so busy, so alert and on a roll all the time that she couldn't even put events into a chronological order half of the time.

\--

Of course one moment stood out.

And of course it was the bad things.

The fucking bad things.

\--

Rumlow had the girls.

She threw up then, just all calm and cool going out of the metaphorical window while Pietro whizzed her into her bathroom and Zach kinda just crumpled into himself on her couch.

Of course, she thought as she vomited up her lunch, Pietro holding her hair out her face, of course it would be him. Of course, and why oh fucking why hadn't her gut directed her towards that from the second she knew Rumlow was alive.

Of course he wouldn't lose a second of a chance to finally get Sarah for himself again.

Hadn't that always been his thing? Hadn't that always been what Julie had confessed to Tess and her to be afraid of? 

She would have loved to stay calm then, would have loved to just shut off her emotions again and be rational about this, to let science and facts speak, to believe in their abilities to solve this and put to right what had been wronged.

But a monster had her friends.

And she couldn't be strong anymore.

So she freaked out.

And with it threw Zach over an edge she hadn't even known him to clung onto in her.

And when she blinked back into the right space in her mind, too drained to do anything anymore, she found herself held by Pietro on the couch, Wanda stroking over her back. Zach cowering in a corner of her quarters, Clint on his knees before him, gentle hands on Zach's trembling knees, Tony at his shoulders, Barnes in her doorway.

And Steve not there.

And aside from the newfound determination to find the girls more than ever, Sammy's heart also began to realize that whatever it was she felt for Steve it wasn't as strong as she had believed it to be.

A week later the locket incident put a lid on it. 

\--

Barnes left. Chasing after a lead.

Sammy clung to that hope with all her mental strength.

And she clung to Pietro.

\--

Hope was the strongest weapon in a human's hand.

Not a gun. Not a knife. Not a strong fist. Not words slashed like a whip.

It was always hope.

Because people with hope didn't give up.

People who didn't give up were survivors.

And survivors were dangerous because they knew how to cheat death and stand up again.

Again and again.

\--

And if there had ever been a word to describe Strike Team Alpha with, then it would be survivor.

\--

Sammy hated sitting in front of a button covered desk in the control room, staring at blinking lights and code lines racing over a monitor, but Monica had gotten sick and Sammy had jumped to take her shifts because the Avengers had been called out onto an emergency in Los Angeles and she had wanted to be as noisily close to everything despite her potential time off.

Now the battle against Rumlow was over, she had grabbed a couple of sleep once the gang had returned to base and she was still smiling when she thought over Pietro slipping into her quarters once Clint had been taken care of. A few hours of sleep with strong arms holding her and a warm body at her back had given her strength enough to even be able to chuckle in memory at Pietro's protesting grunting when her alarm had gone off to be ready for a next shift.

It felt different than with Steve.

It felt...

"Red light blinking." Zach's bored voice had her jump, bringing her out of her thoughts and back into the present where he had been sitting next to her for about an hour now, bored out of his mind and still not comfortable being alone. He was still too freaked out.

She looked down at the control buttons and the monitor screen, frowned at the crypted call coming in from one of their own given out safe numbers. A few flicks of her fingers later to find out whom the number was assigned to, Sammy nearly jumped out of her skin and actually jumped out of her chair, scaring all wits out of Zach as her chair crashed over.

The entire control room went dead silent.

While she stared down at the phone attached to the communication control monitor.

Her heart pounding in her chest.

Louder. And louder. And louder.

Her hand snapped out and everything inside of her head got so very very silent and everything that had happened in the weeks and a half ceased to matter.

She picked up the phone.

"Yes?"

How her voice sounded so stable was a puzzle to her.

Her heart was pounding so hard it might shatter her ribs.

"Sammy?"

Oh god.

It was true.

It was him.

"Sammy. I need you to find Clint."

Oh god.

OH GOD.

"To tell him what?" 

And there it was, there was the shaking in her, there was the hitch in her breath.

And Bucky spoke with the sound of victory in his voice, with a laugh, with a smirk.

With fucking joy.

"I found Strike Team Alpha. The girls are live."

And her hand snapped out to grab Zach's wrist and her head turned around to look at him as her whole body began to tremble with something she couldn't even name relief anymore. 

"Can you..." And she rammed her free hand onto the speaker button on the controls, dropped the phone down onto the desk as her lips finally, FINALLY, pulled themselves into that grin that told Zach more than anything else could and he snapped a hand over his mouth, tears jumping into his ears. "Can you repeat that for me, Barnes?"

And he laughed.

"I found Strike Team Alpha. The girls are alive."

And the control room erupted into the most joyful cheering that Sammy had heard in years.

\--

The End.

For now.


End file.
